Sean Fury, artist behind 'biracial,' doesn't care if you laugh at him

A bonus discussion with the man behind the viral TikTok song.

If you’ve been on TikTok at all in the last two months, you’ve definitely heard the song “bi-racial.” The song, written and recorded by artist Sean Fury, has been used in hundreds of videos on the app.

“She won't go through it, won't ever do it, never prove it let it go
She's biracial
She's a biracial girl.”

Fury’s song is the background music for videos ranging from ones expressing pride in bi-racial heritage to satirizing the fetishization of those who are mixed race or who have lighter skin and looser textured hair. The song delves into the pressure many mixed race people feel to “choose a side” and the feelings of not fitting in.

The song is stuck in my head and I found myself singing the lyrics while checking my email and doing dishes. Losing my mind, I went to Google to learn about who Sean Fury is and why this song is suddenly everywhere.

Turns out, “bi-racial” is far from Fury’s only song and is actually one of 11 songs on his aptly titled 2009 album, Ladies Of Color. This isn’t the first time Sean Fury and “bi-racial” have gone viral. When the video for the song was released in 2012, there were articles written about how “awkward” it was. (The linked article is incredibly mean.)

I immediately shared the album with my group chat and honestly, it lives up to the bio on Fury’s website: “Whoever you are and whatever mood you are in, the king of versatility has you covered.” And, after speaking with Fury himself, I’m convinced he’s really genuine in his art.

“It’s exciting … it’s fun, but I never let things like that go to my head. You get a certain level of love and then you get a certain level of hate so it balances out so for me,” Fury told me Monday when I ask him about blowing up on TikTok. “I'm happy people are finally catching on to it because I put a lot of love into it.”

Fury actually wrote one of the album’s songs, “Ebony Princess” in 1990 and said it’s the song that laid the blueprint for the whole body of work. “I felt that Black women weren't getting the proper respect and they were being alienated. I just wasn’t comfortable with how people were treating Black women, period,” he said of writing the song. After realizing he had a lot of “experiences to share,” he decided to start working on a full album about his admiration for all women because, “everyone deserves an anthem.”

“I basically went down the line and said, ‘there are so many beautiful women in the world and they need to be appreciated.’”

But the song “bi-racial,” easily the most popular song on the album, wasn’t actually inspired by a romantic relationship — it was his bi-racial twin daughters, who Fury explained were talking to him spiritually before they were born. “I actually heard them talking to me when I was writing that song.”

Fury says he’s instilling in his daughters to be proud of their heritage and to treat everyone with respect. “People deal with you based on your character, not your economy. Because your economy doesn’t define who you are.”

Although people have asked, Fury told me he isn’t planning on a follow up to Ladies Of Color. He doesn’t only write about the women in his life; he has songs about homelessness, rape, and domestic violence, too. “I'm just doing a lot of different things and I stay writing new material on all different parts of life,” he said.

As for all the people who mock Fury’s lyrics and dance moves, he doesn’t let it phase him:

“It’s easy to to make fun of someone but it takes a lot of courage to stand up for what you believe … I've heard for years different comedians get on their TV shows and actors make fun of me and say certain things and at the end of day, I see them still dancing to my song and trying to dance like me.”

When my group chat and I listened to Ladies Of Color, its earnestness made us laugh and smile. There’s something to be said about how the obvious lyrics actually convey a pretty meaningful — and honestly elusive — understanding of beauty standards, race, and intersectionality. Sean Fury makes finding beauty in all people sound easy — and it should be.

You can listen to Ladies of Color on Spotify.